Christine B. Whelan

Not for school but for life we learn.

–Seneca

This quote from Seneca is my high-school motto and I use it in the first lecture for most of my classes. I’m a firm believer that academic research can and should be useful to all of us in our day-to-day lives. My favorite classes are ones chock full of fodder for cocktail party conversation. Cool ideas and new perspectives. Fun facts and counter-intuitive approaches. Knowledge that will hopefully germinate into food for thought for years to come.

I’ve taught a half-dozen sociology classes on marriage, gender, social change and everyday life. Soon I’ll be debuting a course on Consuming Happiness and helping to design Living 101, the newest – and coolest – way to introduce students to all that the School of Human Ecology has to offer. I also direct the Money, Relationship & Equality Initiative. Stop by to chat: My latest book, The Big Picture: A Guide to Finding Your Purpose in Life, may help your frame that important question of what’s next in college and beyond.

The MORE Initiative

MORE, the Money, Relationships & Equality initiative at the University of Wisconsin– Madison, provides research, teaching and outreach to establish equality for women and men in relationships, family life and financial decision making, while embracing central questions of self-worth, purpose and meaning-seeking throughout the life course.

Christine B. Whelan is a clinical professor in the Department of Consumer Science. She is the director of the Money, Relationships & Equality Initiative in the School of Human Ecology. In partnership with the Center for Financial Security, Dr. Whelan teaches and researches on topics of self-improvement, gender, relationships formation and purpose throughout the life course. Prior to joining the School of Human Ecology, Dr. Whelan was a visiting assistant professor in the sociology departments at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Iowa.

Dr. Whelan received a doctorate from the University of Oxford for her research on the quest for self-control and self-improvement in American since the 1950s. She continues to research behavioral change literature and programs, incorporating aspects of applied sociology into her teaching. As a nationally recognized expert in the field of self-improvement, Dr. Whelan has authored two books on best practices for emerging adults — Generation WTF (Templeton Press, 2011) and The Big Picture (Templeton Press, 2016) — and has published op-eds in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post , USA Today, Chronicle of Higher Education, and quoted as an expert on self-improvement in Forbes, SELF, City Journal and many others.

Dr. Whelan received a doctorate from the University of Oxford for her research on the quest for self-control and self-improvement in American since the 1950s. She continues to research behavioral change literature and programs, incorporating aspects of applied sociology into her teaching. As a nationally recognized expert in the field of self-improvement, Dr. Whelan has authored two books on best practices for emerging adults — Generation WTF (Templeton Press, 2011) and The Big Picture (Templeton Press, forthcoming) — and has published op-eds in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post , USA Today, Chronicle of Higher Education, and quoted as an expert on self-improvement in Forbes, SELF, City Journal and many others.